We are the
American Postal Workers UnioN
Local 390.
Representing employees and retirees of the U.S. Postal Service’s Clerk, Maintenance, and Motor Vehicles Divisions
110
Maintenance Employees
520
Clerks
20
Union Leaders
40
Motor Vehicle Employees
About APWU
The APWU represents more than 200,000 USPS employees and retirees, and nearly 2,000 private-sector mail workers.
For more than five decades, APWU has fought for dignity and respect on the job for the workers we represent, as well as for decent pay and benefits and safe working conditions. As an AFL-CIO affiliate, the APWU supports the struggle for social and economic justice for all working families and the building of labor power through organizing and collective struggles for working class people.
Our union is a democratic organization comprised of dues-paying members who belong to more than 800 state and local unions and retiree chapters in every state and territory. APWU officers are directly elected by union members. One member, one vote!
The union’s state and local affiliates are autonomous organizations that rely on the national union to represent their interests in contract negotiations and in national-level grievances. The union negotiates a national Collective Bargaining Agreement and fights for our members’ interests on Capitol Hill. The APWU also has many Retiree and Auxiliary chapters so that former postal workers and postal families can remain active in union affairs.
History of the Local
Owney the Postal Dog
Mail clerks in Albany and around the country adopted Owney, the terrier mutt, as the unofficial mascot of the Railway Mail Association, our predecessor union. Each time Owney returned to Albany, he’d have a new medal or tag on his collar to show where he’d been. Someone eventually made Owney a full-body harness to hold the weight of so many medals and tags. You can read more about Owney on the Postal Museum website.
Owney belonged to a postal clerk from Albany, NY and started becoming a regular visitor to the post office in 1888. Initially he rode on the Railway Post Office train throughout the state of NY. Later he traveled on trains around the country and then made an around-the-world trip on both trains and steamships. On June 11, 1897, a postmaster ordered that he put put down while agitated for being chained up in an unfamiliar post office.
